The phoneme theory. The vowel system

The Phoneme Theory

As you probably know from the course of general linguistics, the definitions of the phoneme vary greatly.

The truly materialistic view of the phoneme was originated by the linguist - L.V. Shcherba. According to L.V. Shcherba the phoneme may be viewed as a functional, material and abstract unit. These three aspects of the phoneme are concentrated in the definition of the phoneme suggested by V.A. Vassilyev, who looks upon the phoneme as " ... a dialectical unity of these aspects because they determine one another and are thus interdependent".

So, the phoneme is a minimal abstract linguistic unit realized in speech in the form of speech sounds, opposable to other phonemes of the same language to distinguish the meaning of morphemes and words. Views of the phoneme seem to fall into four main classes.

The "mentalistic" or "psychological" view regards the phoneme as an ideal "mental image" or a target at which the speaker aims. He deviates from this ideal sound partly because of the influence exerted by neighbouring sounds.

The phoneme is material, real and objective. That means that it is realized in speech of all English - speaking people in the form of speech sounds, its allophones. The sets of speech sounds, that is the allophones belonding to the same phoneme are not identical in their articulatory content though there remains some phonetic similarity between them. All the allophones of the same phoneme have some articulatory features in common, that is all of them possess the same invariant. The articulatory features which form the invariant of the phoneme are called distinctive or relevant.

According to this (1) conception allophones of the phoneme are varying materializations of it. This view was originated by the founder of the phoneme theory, the Russian linguist S.A. Baudauin de Courtenay. The same point of view was shared by E.D. Sapir, Alf. Sommerfelt. On the other hand, it is definitely not possible to establish such ideal sounds which do not exist in reality. For this reason the American linguist L. BIoomfield and his followers rejected the view.

The so-called "functional" view regards the phoneme as the minimal sound unit by which meanings may be differentiated without much regard to actually pronounced speech sounds. According to this conception the phoneme is not a family of sounds, since in every sound only a certain number of the articulatory features, that is those which form the invariant of the phoneme, are involved in the differentiation of meanings. It is the so-called distinctive features of the sound which make up the phoneme corresponding to it. This view is shared by many foreign linguists: L. BIoomfield, R. Jakobson, M. Halle. The functional view of the phoneme gave rise to a branch of linguistics called "phonology" or "phonemics" which is concerned with relationships between contralisating sounds in a language. Its special interest lies in establishing the system of distinctive features of the language concerned. Phonetics is limited in this case with the precise description of acoustics and physiological aspects of physical sounds without any concern of their linguistic function.

A stronger form of the "functional" approach is advocated in the so-called "abstract¹¹ view of the phoneme which regards phonemes as essentially independent of the acoustic and physiological properties associated with them, that is of speech sounds.

The "physical" view regards the phoneme as a group of articulatory similar sounds without any regard to its functional and abstract aspects.

Summarizing we may state that the materialistic conception of the phoneme first put forward by L.V. Shcherba may be regarded as the most suitable for the purpose of teaching.

Transcription is a set of symbols representing speech sounds. Phonetics transcription is a good basis for' teaching the pronunciation of a foreign language, being a powerful visual aid. To achieve good results it is necessary that the learners of English should associate each relevant difference between the phonemes with special symbols, that is each phoneme should have a special symbol. It not, the difference between the pairs of sounds may be wrongly associated with vowel length which is not-distinctive in modern English.

The English Vowel System

From phonological point of view we should consider such principle as the position of the tongue. It is characterized from two aspects, that is the horizontal and vertical movement.

According to the horizontal movement English vowels are divided into five classes (Russian scholars):

British phoneticians do not single out the classes of front-retracted and back-advanced vowels. So both [i:] and [i] vowels are classed as front, and both [к:] and [if ] vowels are classed as back. The latter point of view doesn't seem to be consistent enough, because vowels in these two pairs differ in quality due to the raised part of the tongue.

The other articulatory characteristic of vowels as to the tongue position is its vertical movement. British scholars distinguish three classes of vowels: high (or close), mid (or half-open), and low (or open) vowels. Russian phoneticians made the classification more detailed distinguishing two subclasses in each class that is broad and narrow variations of the three vertical position of the tongue. Thus the following six groups of vowels are distinguished:

Another feature of English vowels which is sometimes included into the principles of classification is lip rounding. Traditionally three lip position are distinguished: spread, neutral and rounded.

English vowel sounds have another property, which is traditionally termed checkness. This guality depends on the character of the articulation from a vowel to a consonant. As a result all English short vowels are checked when stressed. The degree of checkness may vary and depends on the following consonant. Before fortis voiceless consonant it is are tense while historically shot vowels are lax. There're no tense vowels in Russian.

Summarizing we could say that phonological analysis of articulatory features of English vowels allows to consider functionally relevant the following two characteristics:

a) stability of articulation, *

b) tongue position.

Stability of articulation specifies the actual position of the articulating organ in the process of the articulation of a vowel. There are two possible varieties:

a) the tongue position is stable;

b) it changes.

In the first case the articulated vowel is relatively pure in the second case a vowel consists of two clearly perceptible elements. There exist in addition a third variety, an intermediate case, when the change in the tongue position is fairly weak. So according to this principle the English vowels are subdivided into: monophthongs, diphthongs, diphthongoids.

Summarizing its worth saying that phonologically relevant articulatory features should attract attention of a future teacher of English because they form the basis of the pronunciation system of the language. If we want to speak a foreign language in a correct way it is natural we should pay more perceptible than before a lenis voiced consonant or sonorant. All long vowels are free.

The English monophthongs are traditionally divided into varieties according to their length:

Vowel length or quantity has been the point of disagreement for a long time . When sounds are used in connected speech they cannot help being influenced by one another. Duration is one of the characteristics of a vowel wich depends on the following factors:

1) its own length,

2) the accent of the syllable in which it occurs,

3) phonetic context,

4) the position of the sound in the syllable,

5) the position of the sound in the rhythmic structure,

6) the position of the sound in a tone group,

7) the position of the sound in a phrase,

8) the position of the sound in an utterance,

9) the type of pronunciation,

10) the style of the type of pronunciation.

Tenseness is one more articulatory characteristic. It characterizes the state of the organs of speech at the moment of production of a vowel. Historically long vowels

The English Consonant System

a) Classification of Consonants.

b) Peculiarities of Articulation.

Consonants are known to have voice & noise combined. In case of consonants various obstructions are made. So consonants are characterized by close articulation, that is by a complete, partial or intermittent blockage of the air-passage by an organ or organs. As a result consonants are sounds which have noise as their indispensable and most defining characteristic.

On the articulatory level each consonant may be identified by stating two general facts about it:

1) what sort of articulatory posture it is formed by;

2) whereabout in the mouth (or pharynx) it is produced.

The particular quality of consonant may depend on a lot of other factors, that is by what articulatory organ (or organs) an obstruction is made, how vocal cjiords work at the moment of production, what cavity is used as a resonator, what is the force of articulatory effect, etc.

Classification of Consonants. There are few ways of seeing the situation of classification.

According to V.A. Vassilyev primary importance should be given to the type of obstruction and the manner of production of noise. On this ground he distinguishes two large classes of consonants:

a) occlusive, in the production of which a complete obstruction is formed;

b) constrictive, in the production of which an incomplete obstruction is formed.

[ti:] - [si] tea-sea (occlusive - constrictive) [si:d} - {si:z} seed-seas (pcclusive-constrictive)

Each of the two classes is subdivided into noise consonants and sonorants. The division is based on the factor of pravailing either noise or tone component in the auditory characteristic of a sound. In their turn noise consonants are divided into plosive consonants (or stops) and affricates.

Soviet phoneticians suggested the basis principle of classification the degree of noise. According to this conception the English consonants are divided into two general kinds: noise consonants and sonorants.

The fact is that Russian phoneticians look at English affricates through the eyes of a phoneme theory, according to which a phoneme has three aspects: articulatory, acoustic and functional, the latter is the most significant one. As to British phoneticians, their primary concern is the articulatory-acoustic unity of these complexes, because their aim is limited by practical reasons of teaching English. So it's necessary to define the articulatory indivisibility of these complexes. This procedure is carried out according to the rules worked out by N.S. Trubetskoy. According to his point of view a sound complex may be considered monophonemic if:

a) its elements belong to the same syllable;

b) it is produced by one articulatory effort;

c) its duration should not exceed normal duration of either of its elements.

The rules suggested by N.S. Trubetskoy are based on articulatory and phonological indicators. They permit us to define the phonetic status of sound complexes. Talking about sonorants it is necessary to mention that they are consonants that phoneticians have traditionally a lot of arguments about. The peculiarity of sonorants - the auditory effect is tone, not noise makes sonorants sound more like vowels than consonants. On this ground some of the British phoneticians refer some of these consonants to the class of semivowels [r], [j], [w]. Acoustically sonorants are opposed to all other consonants because they are characterized by sharply defined formant structure and the total energy of most of them is very high. However, on functional grounds, according to their position in the syllable [r[, [j], [w] are included in the consonantal category but from the point of view of their phonetic description they are more perfectly treated as vowel t glides. According to the Soviet phoneticians sonorants are considered to be consonants from articulatory, acoustic and phonological point of view and refer to the group of consonants, [vi: i] - [wi; i] - veal - wheel (noise cons.-sonorant).

Summarizing we may say that two above-mentioned characteristics - the degree of noise and the manner of articulation - are considered essential. Both classifications are valid, consistent and complete, though we could assume that the latter is more preferable for teaching purpose because it is more concise.

The place of articulation is another characteristic of English consonants. The place of articulation is determined by the active organ of speech against the point of articulation. According to this principle the English consonants are classed into:

1) labial (bilabial, labio-dental)

2) lingual (forelingual, mediolingual, backlingual)

3) glottal.

Another sound property of the English consonants is voiced-voiceless characteristic which depends on the work of the vocal chords. All voiced consonants are weak & all voiceless consonants are strong (latter-ladder). The voicing difference is important, since it is the distinctive feature of the consonants.

Another articulatory characteristic - the position of the soft palate. According to this principle consonants can be oral & nasal. Nasal occlusive sonorants [m], [n], [ h ], require the lowered position of the soft palate.

The problem of affricates is a point of considerable controversy among phoneticians. According to Sovet specialists in English phonetics, there are two affricates in English, they are [fj, dz]. D.Jones points out six of them [tf, dz, [ts.dz], [tr, dr]. Gimson increases their number adding two more affricates [tfl, dcT].

So British phoneticians name eight affricates [ts], [dz], [tr], [dr], [ts], [dz], [t#], [d$]. This point of view is consistent with an articulatory & acoustic view & underestimates the phonological aspect.

On the other hand, Soviet phoneticians are consistent in looking at the phenomenon from the morphological & the phonological point of view which allows them to the categorize [tf], [dz] as monophonemic units & [tr], [dr], [ts], [dz], [tP], [d0] as biphonemic complexes.

The main articulatory features:

1) type of obstruction;

2) place of obstruction & the active organ of speech;

3) force of articulation.

These articulatory features are the prime ones as they specify the essential quality of a consonant which is enough to describe it as an item of a system. On this level of analysis it is the point where the distinction between consonants becomes phonemic that matters. To make the description of articulation complete we use some additional information for comparison between the English consonants & those of the mother tongue, that is considerably important for teaching purposes. Phonetics is itself divided into two major components: segmental phonetics, which is concerned with individual sounds (i.e. "segments" ot speech) and suprasegmental phonetics whose domain is the large units of connected speech: syllables, words, phrases and texts.

Modifications of Phonemes in Connected Speech

1. English Vowels in Connected Speech

2. English Consonants in Connected Speech

The modifications of vowels in a speech chain are traced in the following directions: they are either quantitative or qualitative or both. These changes of vowels in connected speech are determined by a number of factors such as the position of the vowels in the word, accentual structure, tempo of speech, rhythm etc.

The shortening of the vowel length (the decrease) is known as a quantitative modification of vowels:

1) it occurs in unstressed position (black-board [э:]). In this case it affects both the length of the unstressed vowels & their quality;

2) the English vowels have positional length. The vowel [i:] is the longest in the final position, it is obviously shorter betore the lenis voiced consonant [d] & it is the shortest before the fortis voiceless consonant [t].

Qualitative modification of most vowels occures in unstressed position. Unstressed vowels lose their quality, which is illustrated by the examples below: 1) man [rroen] - sportsman ['spo:tsman], conduct ['kundakt] -[kan'dA kt]. In such cases the quality of the vowel is reduced to the neutral sound [э]. The neutral sound [a] is the most frequent sound of English. In continuous text it represents about eleven per cent of all sounds. This high frequency of [з] is the result of the rhythmic pattern. The English rhythm prefers a pattern in which stressed syllables alternate with unstressed ones. Compare: analyse ['26 ng^laiz] - analysis [a'nselisi] - in both words full vowels appear in the stressed positions, alter-nating with [a] in unstresses position. It's impossible to have a full vowel in every unstressed syllable. One of the wide-spread sound changes is certainly-vowel reduction. Reduction is actual qualitative or quantitative weakening of vowels in unstressed position: board -blackboard, man-postman.

In rapid colloquial speech reduction may result in vowel elision, the complete omission of the unstressed vowel, which is also known as zero reduction: history, factory, territory. It often occurs in initial unstressed syllables preceding the stressed one, (e.g. correct, suppose, perhaps) & is conditioned by the tempo, rhythm & style of speech.

2. Till this time we have looked at sound individually. But language in everyday use is not represented by isolated, separate units; it is performed in connected sequences of larger units, in words, phrases, longer utterances. There are some remarkable differences between the pronunciation of a word in isolation & of the same word in a block of connected speech. These changes are mostly quite regular. Still the problem of defining the phonemic status of sounds in connected speech is too complicated, because of the numerous modifications of sounds in speech. These modifications are observed both within words & at word boundaries. Speech sounds influence each other in the flow of speech. As a result of the intercourse between consonants & vowels & within each class there appear such processes of connected speech as assimilation, accomodation, vowel reduction & elision which is sometimes called deletion.

The adaptive modification of a consonant by a neighbouring consonant in the speech chain is known as assimilation (the alveolar [t] followed by the interdental [в] becomes dental: eighth, at three.

The tern "accommodation" is often used by linguists to denote the interchanges of "vowel + consonant type" or "consonant + vowel type", for instance, some slight degree of nasalization of vowels preceded or followed by nasal sonorants: never, men.

Elision or complete loss of sound, both vowels & consonants, is often observed in English. On hearing a sequence like [z'nik¹ kAmir) ], the listener unmistakably reconstructs: Is Nick coming?

Consonants are modified according to the place of articulation. Assimilation takes please when a sound changes its character in order to become more like a heigbouring sound. The characteristic which can vary in this way is nearly always the place of articulation & the sounds concerned are commonly those which involve a complete closure at some point in the mouth that is plosives & nasals : "said that", "dry".

The manner of articulation is also changed as a result of assimilation: л

1) Loss of plosion. In the sequence of two plosive consonants the former loses its plosion: glad to see you.

2) Nasal plosion. In the sequence of a plosive followed by a fnasal sonorant the manner of articulation of the plosive

sound & the work of the soft palate are involved, which results in the nasal character of plosion release: "sudden", "not now".

3) Lateral plosion. In the sequence of a plosive followed by the lateral sonorant [1] the noise production of the plosive stop is changed into that of the lateral stop "settle", "table".

The voicing value of a consonant may also change through assimilation. This type of assimilation affects the work of the vocal cords & the force of articulation. In particular voiced lenis sounds become voiceless fortis when followed by another voiceless sound: newspaper, have to do it. The change of voiceless fortis consonants into voiced lenis as a result of assimilation is not typical for English language.

Lip position may be affected by the accomodation , the interchange of consonant vowel type. Labialisation of consonants is traced under the influence of the neighbouring back vowels: moon, soon, cool etc. the spread lip position -tea - beat, meet- team.

The position of the soft palate is also involved in the accomodation. Slight nasalization as the result of prolonged lowering of the soft palate is sometimes traced in vowels under the influence of the neighbouring [m[ & [n]. (and, morning, men).

To summarize all mentioned above, assimilation affecting the place of articulation is considered to be most typical of the English sound system & assimilation affecting the work of the vocal cords is most typical of the Russian speech.

Word-stress in English

1. The nature and the main characteristics of word-stress in English.

2. The theory of "degrees of stress" and three main tendencies in present-day English.

3. The accentual types.

4. The functional aspect of word-stress.

The syllable or syllables which are pronounced with more prominence than the other syllables of the word are called stressed or accented. In English word stress or accent is a complex phenomenon, marked by the variations in force, pitch, quantity & quality. The dynamic & the tonic features of English word stress prevail over the others. English language processes predominantly dynamic word stress.

The nature of word stress, the interrelation of its components is still a problem which is awaiting its solution. The main drawback with any theory of stress based on production of speech gives only partial explanation of speech gives only partial explanation of the phenomenon & doesn't analyse it on the perceptive level.

The vowel of the stressed syllable is perceived longer than the same vowel in the unstressed one, that is the vowels of full length are unmistakably perceived as stressed. So the quantitative & qualitative components of word stress are also significant.

Another characteristic of a vowel is prominence. Prominence in speech is a broader term than stress. It is obtained by the component of word stress, such as the loundness, the length, the quality of the vowel plus the inherent sonority of the vowel & its historical length.

Languages are also differentiated according to the placement of word stress (fixed stress & free stress). The free placement of stress is observed in the English & Russian languages, that means in one word it may fall on the first syllable, in another on the second syllable, in the third word-on the last one (beginning, ethnic; озеро, погода, молоко). The word stress in English as well as in Russian is not only free but it may be shifting-contrast-cont'rast, 'habit-hab'itual).

There are actually as many degress of stress in a word as there are syllables. A. Gimson, for example, shows the distribution of the degrees of stress in the word examination. The British linguists usually distinguish three degrees of stress in the word. The primary stress is the strongest (1), the secondary stress (2), all the other degrees are termed weak stress. The American scholars B. BIoch & G. Trager mark four contrastive degrees of word stress: loud, reduced loud, medial & weak stresses effect of prominence is often produced certain combinations of the two."

Lilias Armstrong and Ida Ward define intonation as follows: "By intonation, we mean the rise and fall of pitch of the voice when we speak".

However, some foreign linguists in their latest works are beginning to define sentence intonation also as something more than just variations of pitch. Thus, L.S. Hultzen in his article Grammatical Intonation published in 1964 in the collection of papers In Honour of Daniel Lones (on the occasion of the latter's eightieth birthday) writes: "I use the term intonation in a somewhat different way from that in which it is often used ... An intonation is pattern of accent; an accent is a composite of relative pitch, loudness (= stress in some systems), and length ..."

The terminal tones are the falling tone, the rising tone, the rising-falling tone, the falling-rising tone.

Intonation performs its sentence-constitutive function not only in oral speech, but also in written language.

Intonation is implicitly present in any written sentence. It is the writer who puts it there in the process of expressing in written form his thoughts, will, emotions, feelings and attitudes. When writing he intends hid intonations to be reproduced by subsequent readers (both in silent and loud reading) as closely to the original as possible.

The proof of intonation being implicitly present in a written sentence is provided by the use of punctuation marks.

Of course, they cannot represent exactly the whole gamut of the extremely rich and varied intonations of living speech.

2. When the speaker wants to draw special attention to a word in a sentence he makes it more prominent than the other stressed words. It is given a greater degree of force and has wider range of pitch (the High Fall, the Rise-Fall, etc). Such extra stress singles out the nuclear word (or words) to emphasize the attitudinal meaning. This type of sentence stress is called emphatic.

When 'can you, come, may I ask?

The meaning of the whole sentence can be emphasized either by widening or narrowing the range of pitch. If the range is widened the pitch level is raised. The stressed and unstressed syllable are said on a higher pitch level. The pitch intervals between the stressed syllables are greater than in an unemphatic sentence. The nuclear tone has a wider range. The stress is increased.

If the range is narrowed the pitch level is lowered. The stresses and unstressed syllables are pronounced on a lower pitch. The pitch intervals between the stressed syllables are smaller than in an unemphatic sentence. The nuclear tone has a narrower range. The words are pronounced almost in a whisper. танцовщица, a 'dancing' girl - танцующая девушка, а 'blackboard - классная доска, a 'black 'board - чёрная доска.

Compound verbs have two equal stresses: to 'switch 'on-to 'switch 'off as well as compound numerals ('twenty - 'three).

The typical mistakes of Russian learners in the sphere of word stress are the mispronunciation of: 1) words with the main & secondary stresses (conversational); 2) words with two equal stresses in connected speech ('up'stairs, 'reorganize); 3) words with the full vowel in the unstressed syllable ('architect).

The instability of English accentual structure of words present much difficulty for Russian learners. Students' attention should be attracted to English multisyllabic words & the use of the secondary stress in those words that have no analogy in the Russian language: 'transportation- транспортировка. The group which forms accentual opposition of different parts of speech by way of conversion accompanied by the shifting of stress ('insult -in'sult) requires learners' attention too.

In case of doubt it is advisable to consult a pronouncing dictionary.